On Friday, my day of departure for Oslo started by learning that the op-ed by Muhammad Yunus that the Microcredit Summit team pitched to the International Herald Tribune was published in the weekend edition and titled: Giving Credit Where It’s Due. Bingo! (www.iht.com)

Then I learned that the op-ed by Chris Dendys, the head of RESULTS Canada, was published in the Toronto Star on Friday. Double Bingo! (www.thestar.com)

Actually, we have Microcredit Summit leaders in 48 countries who have agreed to write and pitch op-eds to their largest newspaper this weekend. We’ll see what happens.

I remember a story Prof. Yunus told me many years ago about bringing a Grameen Bank client and board member to Belgium when they received the King Bodoin Award. “She’s never seen an airplane before much less flown on one,” I inquired.

Prof. Yunus shook things up when he replied that he’d recently been with 100 center chiefs (at the time a Grameen Bank center consisted of 40 women) and the meeting was on the second floor. He asked how many of the women had ever been on the second floor before. Only a few had.

A few months later I asked how the client’s visit to Belgium went. He told me that she met the King and spoke at a news conference. What moved people most was this. She said that just before her son died he asked for some sweets, but she didn’t have the money to buy sweets for her son before he died. Then she joined Grameen Bank and her business grew. Now she can buy sweets for all the children in the village, but she couldn’t buy sweets for her son before he died.

This is a small example of the women/owners of Grameen Bank who will share the Nobel Peace Prize with Prof. Yunus.

Sam Daley-Harris, Director

Microcredit Summit Campaign

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 9th, 2006 at 3:34 am and is filed under nobelceremony. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.